2021_Senior_Special_Issue

8 Yellow Springs High School C L A S S O F 2 0 2 1 A Special Section of the YELLOW SPRINGS NEWS | May 20, 2021 Sam & Eddie’s Open Books TCN Behavioral Health Services James A. Tetz, D.M.D GIDEON NAZIRI PARENTS/GUARDIANS: Shante and Micah Naziri My past year has definitely been unconventional. Probably about the same as what everyone else has to say. After graduation I plan to go to Uni- versity of Cincinnati for psychology. I’ve found meaning in my experi- ence here as it is the only time I’ll have a high school experience. Despite the flaws it’s something that will shape me going forward for better or worse. The teachers make the experience memorable. The classes are also small enough that you’ll get used to all of your classmates before long. As far as where I’ll be in 10 years from now, I’m not cer tain, and I wouldn’t want to ruin the surprise. DAKOTAH POLLARD- KERN No response submitted. TROY PRESTON No response submitted. JEREMY RHEINSCHELD LANGE No response submitted. GRIFFIN ROBERTS PARENTS/GUARDIANS: Jacqueline Waggoner Like everything else in the world right now, my last year of high school was rather strange. I was lucky in how minimally I was affected by the pandemic’s effect on education com- pared to some of my peers: I take college credit plus classes and just so happened to have most of my classes already online when the U.S. went into lockdown. Regardless, having my education be completely online was dif ferent. I didn’t really have much reason to go out or do many things at all. However, I feel that despite the physical distance I have become much closer to many of my friends and family due to the pandemic. It seemed that everybody could feel the impending isolation, and in turn every- one was far more open to socializing than they may have been otherwise. My relationships with the town and school seemed to have weakened, just out of them occupying a far smaller role in my daily life than they did pre- pandemic. Like stated before, I still don’t have much reason to be out and about right now. Most students have returned to the high school for in- person classes, however I still remain 100% online. After graduating I intend to move to Columbus to study architecture at Ohio State University. I probably would’ve gone this same route regard- less of the pandemic, however the large amounts of free time the pan- demic left me with did allow me to look more into fields I was interested in. Something that the pandemic has done though is given me an interest in gardening, which has led me to wonder how green spaces could be incorporated into the places we live. Over the course of my senior year I have found that maintaining social connections, even when physically apart, is the most valuable thing to me. I would say that the physical distanc- ing of the pandemic has reinforced this. While we all still had our families to talk to, the pandemic definitely made things very lonely and I think in turn people were ver y open to connect with each other online. This was a comforting silver lining of the pandemic. Though we are not fully through it all, I can confidently say I am leaving the pandemic with more friends than I had entering it. If I had to summarize both the good and bad of Yellow Springs, I would say that it’s very sheltered. I’m glad to have grown up here and I have always felt accepted by the community. I feel this is reflected in how I view the world, and I am thankful that’s how I’ve been raised. However, I feel like this sheltering has sort of blinded me to “the real world” and virtually every- one has told me to anticipate a sort of culture shock. While I’m apprehensive at seeing what the wider world has to offer, I’m also so excited to experience it all. In 10 years I’m hoping that I have a stable job somewhere in the architec- ture field. This is a very broad goal, but it seems difficult to say exactly what will happen 10 years down the line. The world is rapidly changing, and perhaps my circumstances and ideals will along with it. I am very fasci- nated with architecture and hope that pursuing a career in it will work out, but only time will tell if this will work out. At the bare minimum, all I ask for is to have a roof over my head and a friend to talk to. O U R S P O N S O R S